


History of the Youngest Peg'asi

by Morgan_de_Andromeda



Category: Andromeda Six (Visual Novel)
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-12
Updated: 2020-05-12
Packaged: 2021-03-02 17:01:00
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24000247
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Morgan_de_Andromeda/pseuds/Morgan_de_Andromeda
Summary: The traveler Morgan feels some feels after regaining their memory. Damon's there too.
Relationships: Damon Reznor/Traveler
Kudos: 12





	History of the Youngest Peg'asi

**Author's Note:**

> Spoiler warning for Chapter 3 of Andromeda Six, CW for some suicidal ideation and implied child abuse.

“We’re going to Cursa.”   
  
The crew began to disperse, the air still tense and strange. The combined blows of discovering they were being tailed and that their resident amnesiac was in fact the last surviving Peg’asi had left everyone in a mood to one degree or the other. The most affected seemed to be June, who hurried off the bridge without a word, and of course Their Highness themself, Morgan. They stood motionless, staring blankly at the spot where Oppo’s hologram had blinked from existence.

“You should probably get some rest, Newbie,” Damon said, snapping his fingers in front of their nose until they startled and stepped back. “And seriously,  _ do not  _ run off on your own this time.”   
  
“Why not,” they responded flatly, “it worked out great the last two times. I survived a bloody coup, then I regained my memories of surviving a bloody coup.”   
  
“Your luck only has to run out once, and on Cursa bad luck means you die,” Damon lectured as he stared down his nose at them. “Worse, your naivete could get someone  _ else  _ hurt--”

Morgan jerked backwards as if they’d been struck, so suddenly Damon instinctively stepped back himself, holding his hands up protectively. It seemed to take them a few seconds to process their own reaction, at which point they wrapped their arms around themself and muttered, “sorry, I’m sorry.” They took a breath. “You’re right. You’re right. I can’t let my  _ naivete _ get anyone killed  _ again _ .”

Ryona shot Damon a look as she stepped up to intervene. “Morgan,” she murmured in a soft voice, “you’re hyperventilating. Why don’t we--” 

They jerked away again when Ryona tried to place a comforting hand on their shoulder. 

“Don’t,” they snapped between panting breaths. “Don’t.”

Ryona withdrew, the concern on her face deepening. Morgan closed their eyes and buried their face in their hands, trying to take deeper breaths. Damon also stepped back, definitely not the kind of person to talk someone down from a panic attack. Eventually their breathing slowed and they lifted their head.

“Sorry. I’m sorry,” they repeated. “I need to go.”

They quickly walked past Damon and Ryona and left the bridge. 

“What happened?” Ryona asked.

“I told them not to go off on their own again, and they could get themself or someone else hurt,” Damon replied with a shrug, stuffing his hands in his pockets. He heard Calderon sigh.

“You’re not wrong, but they’re probably struggling as it is. Let’s leave them be for now,” the Captain advised.

“I’ll try to check on them later,” Ryona said with a soft, worried smile.

Damon shrugged again and also left the bridge. He didn’t feel guilty, but he did wonder a bit at their reaction. What was it they had said?   
  
_ I can’t let my naivete get anyone killed again. _

Again?

As Damon pondered this, he heard something like a muffled shout and a dull  _ thunk _ . He stopped walking and tilted his head, listening.

_ Thunk _ .

He followed the sound as it repeated at irregular intervals, and before long he reached the room it seemed to be coming from. 

Morgan’s room.

Damon frowned and knocked.

“Newbie?”

_ THUNK _ .

He scowled.  _ They better not be punching the fucking wall. That’ll be messy and Ryona will whine about it. _ He mashed the button to open the door, just in time to see Morgan hurl something at the wall.

_ THUNK! _

Morgan was panting and glaring at a dent at the wall, apparently too focused to have heard the door. Damon glanced down at the object they had thrown. 

It was Morgan’s music box.

“Cal’s going to lose his shit if he sees you’ve dented his ship.”

Morgan started at Damon’s voice, spinning to stare at him. A long pause followed, and Damon raised an eyebrow.

“Can I come in or you going to throw that super valuable momento at me, too?”

“...Come in.”

Damon entered and let the door slide shut behind him. Morgan collected the music box, cradling it in their hands in stark contrast to their earlier aggression.

“Not that I’m against violence for blowing off steam, but I wasn’t joking about Cal,” Damon observed when it was clear Morgan wasn’t going to initiate a conversation. “Plus that can’t be good for your little trinket, either.”

Morgan smiled faintly and pressed their hands to the music box like they did when he first delivered it to their room. A gentle melody filled the room, crystal clear despite the abuse. 

“Kitalphanite’s a hell of a metal, and I have to admit Naressa didn’t spare expense when it came to gifts.” Morgan glanced at the dent they had made. “I’m… sorry about the damage. Maybe now that I’m official I can put a picture over it.”

“Why don’t you take things out on a punching bag like a normal person?” Damon quipped with a smirk.

“Didn’t have a punching bag growing up, so I developed my aim instead.” They closed the music box and bit their bottom lip. “I apologize for freaking out on the bridge. I don’t think I’ve really processed… everything.“

Damon sighed and sat in the room’s lone chair. His smirk grew at Morgan’s perplexed expression. “So,” he said, “process. You learned my tragic backstory, after all.”

They stared at him warily. He couldn’t blame them, really, but his curiosity was piqued so he didn’t plan on leaving until they explicitly asked.

“It’s hardly a fair comparison,” Morgan mumbled.

“Nobody said it was a competition. You’d lose anyway.” 

Morgan chuckled softly, then at last began telling their story.

“I was the eleventh child of a royal family. I was never supposed to be something important, maybe a valuable bargaining chip for a strategic marriage at best. I still got an education in history and etiquette and all that, but probably for the sake of appearances and to be a worthwhile spouse more than anything.

“I wasn’t allowed to leave my wing of the palace unless there was a special event, like a funeral or wedding. The servants, the teachers, my siblings -- they only interacted with me when they had to. All of them except Nerissa, the eldest.”

A soft, fond expression emerged on Morgan’s face.

“She was the heir; she didn’t need to pay any attention to me, but she did. She would visit me as often as she could. She gave me gifts, told me about the world outside. When she thought I was old enough, she… she showed me how to venture further. The palace was full of hidden passages and secret entrances and exits. As long as I stayed out of sight and got back before lessons I could wander so much further, see and hear so much more.”

Morgan was smiling, now, which in turn made Damon frown. He valued his freedom above all else, and to him they were describing a cage. A gilded cage, but a cage nonetheless. Morgan was looking into the distance now, and didn’t notice his expression.

“When I was a teenager, at first I only paid attention to court or servant gossip. But as Nerissa told me more and I listened more closely, I realized things were so much more complicated than even the history lessons would lead me to believe.

“I was caught, once. My mother, Lucrezia, she… she was the kind of person that valued appearances more than all else. When she found out I had been spotted outside my wing, she was  _ furious _ .”

Morgan frowned, some color draining from their face.

“She assigned me a constant guard. Not to protect me, to  _ watch _ me. Every hour of the day, every day of the week. I don’t remember how long that lasted. When I was frustrated I would throw rocks at this tree in my tiny courtyard, and eventually I could hit the same spot every single time. I only got to do it once during the watch, until my mother found out and she had the thing chopped down. It stopped, eventually. I don’t know if Nerissa talked her down or if she just lost interest, but one day the constant patrols stopped and I could explore again. I made sure I was never caught again.

“Eventually I met--” Morgan practically choked on whatever name they were thinking of. “... Eventually a member of the Royal Guard was assigned to me. The one I saw leaving the club.”

For a second their face twisted in rage and they threw the music box at the wall once again, in the same dent they had already made.

“Guessing it wasn’t a pleasant reunion,” Damon observed as they collected the music box.

“Ha!” Morgan laughed, but it was a hollow, humorless sound. They stared down at the music box, kitalphanite shell still unblemished despite their abuse. After a minute they looked Damon in the eye. “It was my fault,” they whispered.

Damon’s eyebrows raised, but he waited in silence for them to continue.

“I thought he was my friend. I showed him the passages, the entrances, and he would help me sneak out.  _ Outside _ of the palace, into the city. For a few hours of freedom I--” 

They shuddered. 

“He told Zovack. They knew how to get into the palace undetected because of me. The royal family, my family, is dead because of me. Nerissa was the only one who  _ actually _ loved me, and she’s dead  _ because of me. _ ” 

Morgan sank down onto their bed and covered their face with a free hand, shoulders shaking as they started to sob. Damon was suddenly struck with deja vu, remembering the first time he’d come to their room. There was the same sense of sadness and despair, but this time they were both  _ acutely _ aware as to why.

“You were right,” Morgan croaked between sobs, “I should be turned over to Zovack. I can’t be useful in any other way. I was only meant to be a bargaining chip, I should even  _ be alive _ I--”

They were panicking again, hyperventilating as they tried to spit out fragmented thoughts. Despite himself, Damon felt… something. Annoyance? Yes, that must be it. Annoyance at this spoiled royal who never had to fight for their own survival, trying to throw everything away. He rose from his chair and kneeled in front of Morgan until they were eye-to-eye, then put his hands on either side of their face. They tried to pull away, but while not violent or aggressive, he was firm in his effort to make them look him in the eye.

Their breathing normalized and their eyes focused. They stared back at him, confused but lucid.

“Do you  _ want _ to die?” Damon asked sharply.

“I can’t--”

“I’m not asking if you  _ should _ die,” he interrupted, “I’m not asking if you  _ deserve _ to die, I’m asking if you  _ want _ to die. If you do, there’s no need to drag this out; Zovack will probably accept you as a trophy just as readily if you’re a corpse.”

His bluntness seemed to break through some wall they had unconsciously built. With some satisfaction he noted a sudden flare of outrage in their blue-green eyes, now even more brilliant against the redness of crying. He waited patiently as they seemed to flit from one emotion to another. Bewilderment, anger, fear. But at long last they closed their eyes and drew in a steady breath, and when they opened them again their gaze was steady and calm.

“I want to live.”

“Good.” 

He withdrew his hands, watching for a beat to make sure they didn’t falter before standing. He dusted off his thighs as though he’d been working in the dirt. 

“Good talk,” he grunted as he turned to leave the room.

“Damon!”

“Wh--”

Damon suddenly found himself wrapped in Morgan’s hug. It took several frozen seconds for him to come back to his wits. He placed a hand at the small of their back, then smirked as he felt them shiver.

“You know, I never took you for the touchy-feely type,” he purred. “Want to explore that side of yourself further?”

Morgan released him immediately, stepping back as a blush spread across their cheeks. 

“You can’t even resist hitting on me when I’m trying to have a genuine moment with you?!” they demanded in a high voice, but despite their embarrassment, they laughed. A real laugh.

He grinned down at them, quipping, “I didn’t hear you tell me to stop.”

“Oh my god, you’re awful.”   
  
“I agree, God’s never done anything for me, either.”

Morgan groaned and started shoving him out of their room. He chuckled as he opened the door.

“...Thanks, Damon,” they called after him, barely audible.

Damon decided the heat crawling up his neck was definitely not worth thinking about, and simply winked as he left the room. He only made it a few paces before Ryona appeared around a corner, carrying some sort of drink and a small cup of pills. She looked between him and Morgan’s doors with a surprised and slightly concerned expression.

“Have you spoken to Morgan?” she asked.

“I did.”   


“Are they all right?”

“Don’t worry, Doc. I think they’ll live.”


End file.
